Dept. of Labor Seasonally Adjusts Out 305,541 Initial Jobless Claims in December

Department of Laughter Labor Report
12/23/10
Full DOL Release

Seasonally Adjusted Data

In the week ending Dec. 18, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 420,000, a decrease of 3,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 423,000. The 4-week moving average was 426,000, an increase of 2,500 from the previous week's revised average of 423,500.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.2 percent for the week ending Dec. 11, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week's unrevised rate of 3.3 percent.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending Dec.11 was 4,064,000, a decrease of 103,000 from the preceding week's revised level of 4,167,000. The 4-week moving average was 4,155,500, a decrease of 38,250 from the preceding week's revised average of 4,193,750.

Unadjusted data

The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 495,587 in the week ending Dec. 18, an increase of 5,311 from the previous week. There were 565,243 initial claims in the comparable week in 2009.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.3 percent during the week ending Dec. 11, an increase of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 4,173,407, an increase of 110,889 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 4.1 percent and the volume was 5,345,467.

The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending Dec. 4 was 8,883,578.

A few observations by Grandpa

The Department of Labor's seasonal adjustments have not remotely accounted for the actual # of people filing initial jobless claims in December. Granted, the U.S. stock market does not care about any "real" figure given the fact that Bernanke has afforded the market manipulators ample capital to push stocks to the moon.

Today, the Department of Laughter Labor reported seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims of 420,000 although the non-seasonally adjusted claims (a.k.a. real people standing in line) was 495,587. For the prior week report (12/11/10), the Department of Laughter Labor reported seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims of 423,000 however the non-seasonally adjusted figure was 490,276. For the prior week ending 12/4/10, the Department of Laughter Labor reported seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims of 423,000 however the non-seasonally adjusted figure was 585,678.   During this three week period, DOL seasonally adjusted out 305,541 Americans.

According to the Department of Labor, 1,266,000 seasonally adjusted initial claims were filed during the first 3 weeks in December however 1,571,541 Americans actually filed claims.

CNBC and every other stock market bull continues to focus on the seasonally adjusted, "once upon a time" figure. Does CNBC and the bulls truly believe 305,541 Americans left out of the headline number has no fundamental impact to our economy?

The DOL seasonally adjusted out the equivalent population of San Bernardino, CA and more than the entire population of Mobile, AL, Grand Rapids, MI or Fort Lauderdale, FL. Salt Lake City, UT would need to add 15,000 to their entire population just to equal the number of people DOL adjusted out of the initial claims report during the prior two weeks.

DOL seasonally adjusted out more than the entire population of Lexington, KY and 31,000 more than the entire population of Plano, TX.